Foreign Policy.

After the AU-EU summit in Abidjan, French President Emmanuel Macron visited several African states, including Ghana. But contrary to other African heads of state, Ghana’s President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has a clear vision of how to make his country independent from development aid.

There is much concern about the future of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, under the new administration. Since the creation of PEPFAR in 2003, the US has been the global leader in responding to the urgent need for the treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS, and the care of orphaned and vulnerable children affected by the disease. With bipartisan support in Congress, PEPFAR was initiated under the Bush administration and continued under the Obama administration.

Last week in Gaborone, Botswana, Laura and I sat in a small room in Tlokweng Main Clinic, a facility that recently started screening and treating women for cervical cancer. Seated with us was Leithailwe Wale, a 40-year-old woman who was diagnosed with the disease. Thanks to early detection and access to treatment, she told us, today she is alive, healthy and able to raise her son.

President Donald Trump met with Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates at the White House on Monday, just days after releasing a budget proposal that would impose deep cuts on funding for many of the causes championed by the billionaire philanthropist.

Late last month, famine was declared in two counties of the civil-war torn East African country of South Sudan. With 100,000 people at risk for dying of starvation in that area alone and millions more on the brink of crisis-level food shortages throughout the country, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir promised "unimpeded access" to humanitarian aid organizations working there.

A group backed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation that works on India's immunization program will now be funded by the health ministry, a government official said, a move in part prompted by fears foreign donors could influence policy making.